


They Carried Gravity

by karmascars



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 10x15, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bottom!Sam, Coda, Comeplay, Fix-It, Frottage, M/M, Rimming, Sibling Incest, Topping from the Bottom, season 10, top!dean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-20
Updated: 2015-04-20
Packaged: 2018-03-24 21:38:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3785167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karmascars/pseuds/karmascars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fix-it coda to 10x15: The Things They Carried. <i>The thing about remembering is that you don't forget.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	They Carried Gravity

**Author's Note:**

> Title and summary are phrases from _The Things They Carried_ , by Tim O'Brien. I mean no disrespect by using them.
> 
> This fic completely disregards anything after 10x15, mostly because at the time of writing this I haven't watched them yet, but also because it's a fix-it fic. We don't get to be happy without going AU, people. It's not that kind of show.
> 
> Happy purring noises at [intotheruins](http://archiveofourown.org/users/intotheruins), who helped me edit.

They get back in the Impala, and leave the cabin behind. Every dry twig that snaps beneath her wheels makes this one muscle in Dean's back twitch. He's holding himself too rigid, has to force his body to relax. Deep breaths -- but not too deep. Don't want to put Sammy on alert.

Dean also suppresses a frown at the memory of another voice saying that name, because Cole didn't mean anything by it. Just a good ol' boy staring death in the face. He could've called them whatever he wanted in there. _Dean's_ nickname for his brother, a dead Trickster's name for Dean. Groucho Marx, Celine Dion. Mario and Luigi.

At least they saved one life tonight.

Over in the passenger seat, Sam is still as four in the morning. He's hunched up small, right in the middle of his space, like he's turning back time and that enormous body is just a shield. Like he's really thirteen, fourteen years old in there, still taking the kill way too hard. Dean understands -- well, likes to think he does. He might. Sammy has always been the sensitive one. He wears his heart on his sleeve.

And there's no reason, Dean tells himself fiercely, to be playing over and over right now like a goddamn busted movie reel all the pain and fear that's shown on Sam's face these past few weeks.

This past _ever_ , some part of him supplies.

Oh, good. More guilt.

Dean can't quit seeing it. The flashes of Sam intersperse with Cole's eyes rolled back, Charlie's battered face beneath his fists, the dead men in Claire's cabin. On and on, all the ones he couldn't save, rolling backward in a grim summation of his life's bloody, thankless work. There's a dull ache swelling in his chest. He grips the wheel tighter, so that the leather creaks and his knuckles crack, and he doesn't have to think so much --

Sam glances over.

It's one of their myriad rituals for Dean to meet his gaze.

Sam, though, he swallows and ducks away, eyes shuttered and shifting across the floorboards. Something in Dean cracks, and goes cold. It's been awhile since his brother took a loss this hard. He's got to be projecting, like Dean knows he's done in the past -- Sam is seeing Dean's face over that soldier's, he's shedding tears over an innocuous little hole in Dean's forehead. Dean's eyes, closed forever.

In a way, it's happened before. Many times. But this time feels different.

Final.

Dean barely sees the motel when he pulls up to it. The Lay-Z Inn. Cute. When Sam opens his mouth to protest, Dean just throws on a bolstering grin, because he is old and tired and _not_ driving twenty hours back to a cold bunker and a room with no Sam in it. "Dunno about you," he says, "but I need a shower. Pizza. Maybe some pay per view, you game?"

Sam's lips do that quirky thing where he means to smile, he really does, but whatever's going on in his head stamps it down. "Yeah, sure," he says, kinda clipped. It's clear he won't be distracted. He's bound and determined to wallow.

The motel office feels too stark, too much white tile and fluorescent light exposing every flaw. Dean would swear he tastes almonds. The clerk is a creepy younger dude who gives him an obvious once-over as they make their exchange, but much to Dean's relief stops short of actually propositioning him. There's no energy for that tonight.

Gigantor is exactly where Dean left him. He still looks far too small when he swings out of his side, and Dean keeps studying him because it's been awhile since he's seen the brother he raised so clearly. This is Sammy in diapers, Sammy toddling around on chubby baby legs; Sammy stubbornly asking where Dad goes all the time. His chin trembling, fury or fear, before his face grew all those angles. Before the sweet curls of his hair became a living thing on top of his head. Sam looks so diminished in the face of this night's work, like this failure among all the times they've come out on top has stripped him of his hard-won growth.

They keep a careful distance apart as they enter the room, and Dean's not sure why. Reflexively, he keeps making jokes that fall flat when Sam's answering expression is the bastard offspring of a wince and a grimace. Despite feeling absolutely disgusting, gritty and tacky with sweat, Dean can't help but offer his brother the first shower. He's desperate, wants to give whatever he can. Anything to make it better.

He sits on his bed, feeling useless.

Suddenly he wants to see Sam smile, the way he hasn't in weeks, that beautiful dimpled thing he carries in his pocket and whips out to blind Dean when Dean is defenseless. He can't think of any way to coax it out, though. Distractedly, he strips to his boxer briefs, and sinks back onto the bed. Listens to the hiss and slap of the water, Sammy moving within it.

Dean hasn't felt the absence of the amulet between his pecs this clearly in he doesn't know how long.

It was like... those soldiers, with their dog tags. The Winchester army, an army of two, their identifying symbol passed from brother to brother. Dean suddenly wants to be wearing that amulet when he --

The water shuts off.

Steam and Sammy kind of... _flow_ into the room. Those broad shoulders of his look more relaxed, so do the lines of his face, but Dean can still see the weariness. It's a unique kind of despair. Dean figures he knows how that feels, but he still doesn't know how to make it better.

He doesn't realize he's been staring until Sam waves a hand in front of his face. "Uh, Earth to Dean?"

Startling, Dean blinks up at him. For some reason, he has to swallow.

Sam looks incredibly self-conscious, but -- and Dean deliberately hasn't thought this way for years, but -- Sam looks _incredible_.

Tall, taller than tall, and stacked like a fucking gym infomercial, the lines of him rise up all trim and taut. He's more relaxed right now, sure, but he holds his tension in his shoulders and his hands, and the scars of the job stand out on his tinted skin like the markings on their beat-up atlas. He's swallowing beneath Dean's scrutiny. Dean is standing, mimicking, wanting to say something, but he can't even remember how to speak the damn language.

“Sam,” he manages, in a hoarse whisper.

Sam looks like he might cry.

Composing himself, Dean gives a quick little nod. “'s alright,” he says. “It'll be all right.”

For a brief moment Sam's head tips back, his eyes close, like the pain is too much -- it claws at Dean's false confidence and he snarls, “It'll fucking be all right,” because what else can he say? He has to promise. He has to give his word, so he'll be forced to keep it. He will force himself to keep living, to keep Sammy safe, no matter what the world throws at them.

“I don't know, Dean,” is not the answer he wants.

Stung, he snaps, “Whassat? 'cyclopedia Brown can't solve the case?”

Sam flinches. “I --” he begins, but stops.

“What?” Dean presses, challenging. There's some kind of charge in the air. It crackles along his skin. He shifts his weight, it brings him too close -- and for some reason, all he can think about is the heat he can feel radiating from Sam. They're inches apart and he can _feel_ his brother there, the same burning presence that's been a staple in his life since it all went to hell. The first time.

Oblivious to this, Sam shakes his head. “I don't know. I don't -- I don't think I can fix this,” he says. He wraps his arms around his chest like he used to do when he was small, and afraid of the dark.

And Dad gave him a fucking .45.

"I don't think I can save --”

“Hey,” Dean interrupts, not because there's anything useful he can add, but because he does not want to hear Sam say those words. He doesn't want Sam to ever have to say them, not if he can help it.

And there's Sammy looking at him woefully, those huge hazel eyes wide, the look in them so bleak.

“You know I'd bet my life on you, right?” Dean says, so softly that it's almost lost beneath the white noise of the window unit.

Sam utters a low noise like he's been slipped a knife between the ribs.

“I would,” Dean says, shifting on his feet. His legs ache. He doesn't know how long this has been building, or even how long he's been standing today, but he doesn't care. He doesn't care about anything except the way Sam is looking at him now, his eyes shining. There's hope in their depths and it fuels Dean in a way that reanimates him. Somehow, it makes him feel whole again.

“I know I've made some stupid-ass decisions,” he says, swaying that much closer. Sam is caught in his orbit, that heat of his searing across Dean's skin. “I know I've let you down. I don't expect forgiveness for the, the disappointment, or the shit I shouldn'ta said --" Sam opens his mouth to protest, but Dean's got two fingers on warm lips before he even thinks about it. “No, listen. Sammy, I took this path because I thought it'd help us win, and all I did was make it easier for us to lose. But we are _not_ gonna lose. We're gonna fight, and keep fighting, until we can fucking retire or some shit and all this'll be,” he slaps the Mark, “is another war story.”

Sam's lips are trembling behind his fingertips.

“No matter what happens,” Dean is whispering now, close enough to feel the frisson of his bare chest almost brushing Sam's, “I'm not leaving you.”

“Promise?” The word tickles. He presses down on Sam's lower lip, just slightly, and a smile starts to bloom around his finger.

Dean nods, not trusting himself to speak.

Their kiss is a foregone conclusion, as natural as Dean's next breath. He meets Sam's gasp and surge forward with a glad little noise of relief. Sam's breath on his upper lip thrills in a warm sort of way. He tastes exactly like Dean never allowed himself to imagine that he would.

Sam is still trembling, his lips against Dean's, his whole body long and lean beneath Dean's hands. Miles of skin and Dean has to feel it all, has to smooth his palms over long swaths of Sam and tickle with his fingertips until Sam is squirming, lips pursing with the effort not to laugh. He keeps kissing Dean, though, pecks and long presses. It's like he can't let go, can't even put an inch between them. Dean's okay with that.

Then Sam's long arms close around him, yanking him even closer. Their hips collide, heat and pressure, Dean gasping wetly into Sam's mouth. Sam laps up every little sound as he tilts his head and deepens the kiss into something hungry and claiming. Suddenly Dean is eating at Sam's mouth, tasting him along his tongue, desperate for all of it. The grip he's got on Sam's arms must be bruising. Sam is panting, breaths devolving into moans that Dean echoes. They're swaying on the spot, they're so wrapped up in one another that they might fall over, but Dean's not worried. There's a bed.

There's a _bed_ \--

He tears his mouth from Sam's, each breath rasping and far too shallow. They stare at one another, wild-eyed, searching faces and eyes dilated with lust.

“Let me --” Sam starts and Dean breathes, “Oh yeah,” and they're reaching for one another, ripping away Sam's towel, falling sideways on to Dean's bed and scrambling to be closer. Sudden spark of alpha dog, the older brother in Dean, makes him wrap his legs around Sam and flip him, pinning him like he used to do when they'd spar. Instead of fighting back, though, Sam tosses his head back on a wild groan, hips rolling up into Dean's.

“Oh,” Dean teases, setting lips and teeth to Sam's bared neck, “it's like that?”

“It's -- like that --” Sam pants. “Oh – _Dean_....”

Dean worries the skin between his teeth, rumbling appreciation when Sam whines.

His brother's huge hands scrabble at the waistband of his briefs, too clumsy in haste and mindlessness to get a grip on them. Dean chuckles into the warm, Sam-scented hollow of neck and shoulder. “Need a hand?” he purrs, and doesn't recognize his own goddamn voice, all liquid sex. Sam moans and gives up, plastering those hands to Dean's ass.

No worries. Dean's got this. He's experienced in such matters, after all. He tosses the briefs somewhere in the room and straightaway ruts up against Sam, an animal noise tearing up and out of his throat. The answering sound from Sam might be his name, but Dean is stealing another kiss, fucking in with his tongue and plundering 'til his brother's moans rise to a fever pitch. Sam's cock is burning hot, tempered steel beside his own, branding a line of arousal and need. It scratches the itch; oh, so good.

Despite his desires when they were younger, Dean never let himself think about this, not even when he was getting handsy with himself and nearing the finish, needing something _anything_ to help him crest the plateau. On rare occasion -- when he was very, very drunk – he'd think about Sam's hands, what it would be like to have them all over his body, and he'd imagine that his own fingers wrapped around his cock were his brother's instead... but he never allowed himself to imagine what it would be like to kiss Sam. That was the final frontier, the uncharted taboo. For some reason, above all the rest, it just felt wrong.

Kissing Sam is something Dean would like to do for the rest of his life.

He realizes he's talking, muttering into Sam's mouth as his hips work, telling him how much he loves the kissing as sweat begins to stand out on his back, his forehead, in the dip of his ass. Sam is trying to say something, it definitely sounds affirmative, but he's out of his mind at this point and just bucking up into Dean with all the grace of a sixth-grader getting a hand on himself for the first time.

True to form, Sam's body locks up, and he keens into Dean's mouth as hot pulses smear between them. He's gasping, shuddering, coming while Dean keeps thrusting through it, the warmth spreading up through his body like wildfire.

It might be the hottest thing that Dean has ever experienced.

He's still hard as fuck but he lets Sam come down easy, slowing the motion of his hips until he's grinding as softly as he's able, coaxing mewls from Sammy's throat and up through lips that Dean has kiss-bitten 'til they're red and used. When he pulls back to smile at Sam -- who looks thoroughly debauched -- his brother just closes his eyes over a sated smile, and lies back with a sigh.

Dean dips his head, nosing through the fresh sweat standing out along Sam's neck, into the soaked strands of his hair. He doesn't care if it's gross, this is home to him, Sam and the way he's always smelled and the warmth of him pressed along every inch of Dean.

“Mmm,” Sam hums drowsily. “I want you to fuck me.”

A punched-out noise as Dean's abs contract and he tries desperately not to lose his shit over those six little words. “Fuck, Sam,” he groans, nearly biting through the side of his lip with an incisor.

“That's the idea,” Sam says cheekily, his voice still low and satisfied.

“Gonna fuckin' kill me,” Dean growls, separating their hips and grimacing with a helpless little chuckle at the way they're stuck together. Sam makes a noise that's half disgusted, half aroused, and as Dean sits back on his heels his breath hitches to see Sam's cock already rising to half mast.

Sam runs a finger through his own come and raises it to his lips, quirking an eyebrow up at Dean. His legs draw up, spread a little. Offering. Dean grabs at the base of his cock. “Sam,” he begins in a warning tone.

“Hmm?” his brother queries innocently, sucking that finger clean. His eyes are ridiculous, Dean thinks, seeing them wide and dilated but sparkling with humor, and the fierce love that has always burned there. Dean never even dreamed it would encompass all of this.

Rather than try and express the emotions tying his gut into knots, Dean smirks instead and leans forward, drawing his own line through the cooling come on Sam's belly. Triumph lances through him when the teasing flees Sam's expression and hunger enters, suffusing that perfect face with heat. Dean suckles at the bitter taste until his finger is clean, and then he runs it lightly, wetly, up the shaft of Sam's cock. The length of it is impressive, straightening and lengthening further as Sam hisses and bites his own lip. He struggles up on to his elbows to watch as Dean encircles the head, then wraps his fingers around the shaft and jacks him, once, twice, then again and again and faster until Sam has to collapse back on to the bed, hips working in Dean's rhythm.

“ _Dean_ ,” he whines, sounding so much like the kid he was that Dean's movements falter.

“Yeah, Sammy?” Dean replies on reflex, watching his hand move over Sam's impressive length, while his other fingers find their way to Sam's balls already drawing up again, and beneath them. Sam pulls his legs up, baring himself for Dean, and Dean's lips snick apart with a soft click of saliva in the face of Sammy's little puckered hole.

God, he's gonna -- he's really gonna --

All he can do is grunt and pitch forward, cupping Sam's junk in one questing palm as he buries his face between Sam's legs and seeks out that furl with his tongue. He teases with the very tip, then flattens his tongue and licks a thick stripe right up over everything. Sam is clean, he barely has a taste. Dean does it again. Grasping fingers clutch at his hair, pressing his face in harder. He can faintly hear shocked noises above him, but his ears are full of his own harsh breathing and the slick squelch of his tongue. The pucker clenches at each touch, Sam echoing the motion with noise, violent tremors seizing through his limbs as he struggles to hold himself in the position he's assumed.

Dean licks in harder, seeking deeper, thrusting in with the thickness of his tongue until he's breaching Sam's body. He has to flatten his hips to the bed and rut against the comforter, has to have some kind of friction because Sam is molten around his tongue, wanton cries growing louder and louder and filling all the available space around them.

He becomes aware of Sam shrieking, “Dean, fuck me, fuck me, please _for the love of god fuck me_ ,” around the same time he decides to toy around his tongue with the tip of a finger. Sam's whole body goes rigid. Dean glances up to see him tossing his head frantically from side to side. Huffing out his satisfaction, Dean rubs at what his tongue has left loose and wet.

When his fingertip dips in, keeps going, it slides in pretty easily but not easily enough. Sam's breath hitches this side of pained, and Dean withdraws as carefully as he's able.

“You got anything?” he asks, licking his lips unconsciously and tasting traces of Sam. His own bottle of lube disappeared during his vacation on the dark side, along with so many other random things. He doesn't know where half the detritus of his life ended up. He's barely gotten Baby back to her usual, pristine self.

_Let's not think about that._ Dean shoves it away down inside.

Sam is a scramble of limbs and it's funny, it is, so Dean laughs at him and the laugh rises up full, and real. It feels so good that Dean keeps on, and Sam glaring at him all red-cheeked and mussed just makes him laugh harder until he has to prop himself up on the mattress, his cheeks aching from smiling so wide.

A crow of triumph, and Sam surfaces from his duffel with a crumpled tube of Astroglide.

He turns as he rises, and tosses it straight at Dean's face. Dean's arm shoots out and he catches it unthinking -- and of course, _of course_ , Sam loosened the cap.

“Y'know,” he begins, stripping the lines of it off his face and flinging them on to the carpet, but Sam just surges in with an absent “mm hmm” and kisses him, mess and all. He pulls back, pecking at Dean's lips, reaching up to swipe some of the mess off Dean's skin himself. He kisses Dean again, deep, leaning into it really hard. Dean goes with it until Sam gasps in hard through his nose, like he's been stung.

“What --” Dean tears his mouth away, but Sam is just looking at him with wide, dark eyes, smiling and one arm is, wait. One arm is reaching around back behind –

Oh.

 _Oh_.

Sam's eyelids flutter and droop as he bites his lip and sinks his finger in deeper. Dean watches, fascinated, as his brother's hips work in little circles. He knows the instant Sam adds another finger, a needy murmur escaping one or both of them, and when Sam's long middle finger finds his prostate Dean moans with him.

Sprawled on the bed beneath his brother, Dean grabs for his cock and hisses, gripping it tight in his fist. So hard, his hips buck up involuntarily when Sam arches his back, adding a third. The angle is awkward but he looks somehow graceful, muscles bunching and working while he opens himself up for Dean, and Dean accepts it for the gift that it is. He takes it all in, eyes darting over every detail. Who knows when -- if -- he'll have this again.

Because, pragmatically, he knows Sam is probably doing this out of pity.

How else could this dream come true?

Then Sam is withdrawing those fingers, flexing that arm, shuffling forward over Dean's lap and all Dean can do is gape like a fish and let him. Sticky fingers enclose his cock. Sam's weight settles lightly over his hips. Sam is guiding, pressing down, and -- and --

“Oh, _Sam_ ,” Dean groans, tipping his head back, his weight on his elbows. His eyes never leave his brother's face as Sam begins to lower himself. Sam's noise as he's breached goes straight to Dean's cock, which twitches so hard it jerks up in deeper, and Sam mutters, “Oh, fuck it _all_ ,” and drops, just fucks himself down so hard that he whimpers, nostrils flaring. Dean bows up beneath him. Spots are dancing across his vision.

“Sammy,” he's panting, over and over, amazed. “Sammy.”

Sam answers with a whine and moves, jerking up with those thigh muscles working taut and strong on either side of Dean. He feels caged, but safe, surrounded by Sam and deep inside -- and ain't that just the most amazing thing that Dean has ever experienced. He didn't know this could exist, didn't dare to think he'd ever get this close to Sammy. It's -- it's transcendent.

He tries to tell Sam all of this but he must be babbling nonsense, because Sam leans forward, shushes him, and kisses him as he drags his body up off of Dean's cock to the tip in one slow glide.

Then, inevitable as gravity, he grinds back down.

Dean feels like he wants to cry, like he could sing, like he could die. Sam controls it all and Dean just takes it, drinks it all in. He watches his brother work, Sam's body like a tender vise around his cock, a god rising above him. Sam has totally done this before, and Dean would be envious of those faceless dudes if it even mattered. It does not. Dean has him now, and if Sam will let him, Dean is gonna keep this for the rest of his natural life. However long that might be.

That doesn't matter, either.

His hands find their way to Sam's hips, gripping the spurs of them too tight. He can't let go. He likes to think he's helping Sam as the rhythm speeds, lifting and slamming down with him every time, as fresh sweat breaks out on Sammy's brow and drips down the strands of his hair. Dean swipes a palm over his brother's forehead, flings the droplets away, grinning hot and open at Sam's breathless laugh. Soon, Sam is practically bouncing on his cock, each thrust Dean meets with a slap of their hips together and a grunt of exertion, fucking up into Sam as hard as Sam is fucking him.

Dean is close, but he wants this to last forever. He doesn't want to cross the finish line only to learn it was a single-lap event. Here's your participation medal, now get out.

But then Sam clenches around him, such sweet torture, and his mind is gone again.

Grabbing at slick skin, digging his heels into the mattress, Dean takes control as well as he's able and yanks Sam down as he thrusts up hard, spearing him with a growl. Sam mewls his pleasure, letting himself be manhandled, his body rippling around Dean's cock. Dean can't get enough of that heat, so _tight_ , the way Sam knows just when to clamp down and make it that much better.

Then Sam stills and grabs at Dean's hands, wrenching them from his hips and up over Dean's head. Pinned, Dean can only gape up at Sam, so much closer now, jolted breaths skating out across his face. Sam's eyes are skittering over his face, obviously wanting but holding back -- Dean's answering smile is shaky, but certain. Sam takes it for what it is. The kiss he molds to Dean's lips takes the breath from them both.

Then, the whole of him plastered against Dean, Sam starts to move again.

Dean groans. The new position gives Sam all the control, lets him fuck down as fast as he wants. He takes it deep, rides Dean with his whole body. Dean gives as good as he gets until the mattress is shrieking. He's moaning, loud and open-mouthed. Sam ducks his head into Dean's shoulder, biting at the muscle so hard it stings, and screams through his teeth. Dean writhes beneath him, digging his heels in so he can work his hips up in short strokes, and when Sam's entire body ripples in reaction --

It almost takes Dean by surprise when he comes.

His cock swells impossibly inside Sam, every muscle in his body locks up, and he's shaking the first pulses into his brother's body when Sam tenses, grunting, thrusting himself onto Dean in short stabs. Dean feels warm all over, each wave of his orgasm impossibly more intense than the last, and with his hands pinned all he can do is let Sam hold him close like he can mold them both together in this brilliant new singularity.

Dean is not surprised to feel tears running down his face as his eyes flicker shut.

It's a long time before either of them moves. Sam is mouthing gently at his bite mark, laving over it with lips and tongue. It's sending tingles of oversensitivity all along Dean's nerves. His cock swells again, blurting the last of his come weakly into Sam's body. He shudders, and Sam laughs, peeling himself away. He sounds tired, but happy, and Dean blinks away a few more tears as he gazes up at his beautiful brother.

It doesn't help them stop when the ache wells up anew in his chest. _This is it,_ he thinks as he tries to keep smiling. He can feel it straining. _This is the part where Sam lets me down easy._

But Sam just leans back down into the mess they've made. He touches his nose to Dean's.

“Don't,” he says, tilting into the most gentle kiss Dean has ever received.

It's too much. Dean has to turn away.

“Hey,” Sam says, and he sounds a little hurt.

“Don't, Sammy,” Dean begs him before he stop himself. He hates the way he sounds, so overwhelmed. “Just -- if you're gonna leave, just, give it to me straight. Don't drag it out.” He closes his eyes. “I can't deal with that,” he says in a rush of nearly silent, painful admission.

“Leave?” Sam is so incredulous, he squeaks. Dean's eyes snap back to him, searching him for any sign of a lie.

Sam shakes his head. “I'm not leaving.”

“But --”

Lips shut him up. “I'm _not_ ,” Sam whispers fiercely against him, kissing him again. He twitches his hips up. Dean slips out, and Sam settles over top of him, bracketing him with tacky limbs. “Not even if, not -- no matter what, Dean. I'm not gonna leave you.”

Dean's shaking his head, stunned, but he's kissing Sam so desperately he's keening into it, and Sam just laughs at him and returns every single one.

 

* * *

 

Later, when they've showered, they're lying on Sam's clean bed. Dean is on his back, arms behind his head, and Sam is propped on one elbow. He's tracing absent lines across Dean's bare chest. His fingertip tickles over Dean's sternum again and again, like he's reminded there's something missing. Dean has never felt its absence so clearly.

Swallowing, he says, “I wish --” and bites the inside of his cheek.

“Yeah?” Sam asks softly, a hint of a smile. Somehow he always knows.

Dean nods, not trusting his voice around the lump that's once again taken up residence in his throat.

“If wishes were horses, we would all ride,” Sam murmurs, a rueful lift to one corner of his mouth. Dean has to touch it, and Sam snatches his hand, presses a kiss to his fingers. “But sometimes, they come true.”

“That's incredibly corny, dude,” Dean says. “Even for you.” But he's smiling.

They fall asleep like that, one of Dean's hands threaded through Sam's hair, breathing each other in as consciousness fades.

 

* * *

 

In the morning Dean wakes to a note and a bundle of wrapped-up Kleenex.

 _Gone for coffee and food_ , the note reads. Nothing more. When Dean opens the bundle, though, he understands. There's nothing more that can be said. Not when this one small thing speaks louder than anything else between them. He unwraps it reverently, lets it dangle on the new leather cord Sam must have bought for it.

The amulet gleams dully in the lamplight.

Breath hitching, eyes stinging, Dean slides it over his head. It falls between his pecs where it belongs, the weight of it achingly familiar.

“Thanks, Sammy,” he whispers hoarsely to the empty room. “I love it.”

   
  
  
  
  
 

**Author's Note:**

> Just a few things:
> 
> * It's a personal headcanon of mine that Sam has had the amulet tucked away this whole time, just waiting to see if Dean wants it back.
> 
> * If you haven't listened to _I Bet My Life_ by Imagine Dragons, you should. It's the boys all over. (Incidentally, _Demons_ is Dean all over -- and intotheruins would like me to add that _Monster_ is Sam -- but is not referenced in this fic.) Dean's little speech to Sam was the lyrics of _I Bet My Life_ , paraphrased.
> 
> Thanks for reading! 
> 
> If you liked this fic, please consider leaving kudos/a comment. I really appreciate feedback. ♥


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